Handpan Music

My office is a noisy place. We have open sitting, with everyone constantly talking to each other or on the phone almost all the time. This creates a very difficult environment for me to concentrate and do my work (when I myself am not talking or presenting). I tried experimenting with various kind of background music over the years to cut off the noise without causing more distraction. (Like I discovered you can't listen to songs with words in it and work - you end up listening to the words!).

A few months ago while we were in Tokyo, we heard this guy - Takao Minemoto busking at the train station in Shibuya. We were instantly mesmerized and fell in love with the instrument (and purchased his album then and there! (something I rarely have done with buskers). Since then, I have been exploring the wonder world of Handpan music on YouTube.

My current understanding of Handpan (mostly derived from Wikipedia) is - it is a derivative of an instrument called Hang made by a German company. Its sound is a mixture of sounds that some of the following instruments produce -  Trinidadian steelpan, Indian ghatam, Thai gong and Indonesian Gamelan.

Anyway for the musical bumpkin that I am handpan music is extremely soothing and something that I can listen to anytime to calm my nerves and focus on whatever task I am doing then. If you have never experienced, I would highly recommend you to go listen to it on YouTube now.